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I shake my head. “You would have resented me and you know it.”
Blair’s gaze falls to the snow-covered grass, her shoulders slouched forward. “I don’t know how to fix it,” she admits, her voice getting choked up. “I broke us, and now . . . I don’t know how to make the pain go away.”
Fuck. It’s one thing to miss what we had, but to be hurting like this . . . Her pain is my weakness, and if I could take the burden from her, just to make it a little easier to breathe, then I’d do it.
Inching toward her, I sit down in the space beside her, not hesitating when I reach out and wrap my arm around her slim shoulder, pulling her into my side. Blair immediately drops her head to my chest, snuggling into me as though I’m her only comfort. “I hate that you’re still hurting, B.”
“I’ve tried,” she whispers. “I’ve dated and tried opening myself up to other people, but I always fell flat. I never allowed myself a chance to grieve what we had because I knew deep down that this was always my home. I wasn’t willing to let go of it, and I . . . I miss you so damn much, Nick. I miss getting to call you every night and send you stupid texts. I miss when you would force me into your stupid truck and take me on ridiculous road trips. I miss everything, but mostly, I miss getting to be loved by you.”
“Then come home,” I tell her, enunciating every word and making sure she truly hears what I’m saying. “Come home to me.”
“What?” she breathes, pushing up from my chest and meeting my stare. Her eyes are wide, filled with equal parts shock, hope, and fear. “I . . . but I ruined us. How could you ever want me to be here again? I thought you couldn’t wait for me to leave.”
I shake my head. “The thought of you packing up and walking out of my life again brings me to my fucking knees, Blair. How can you not see that? I’m fucking terrified of getting close to you because the moment you leave . . . fuck. I won’t survive it again. I love you, Blair. I never fucking stopped, and for a long time, I wanted to hate you for how you tore us apart, but I never could.”
She leans back in, her arm twisting around my neck, and I pull her onto my lap so she straddles me. “I’m sorry,” she whispers again. “I hate that I hurt you, and I don’t know how to make it right.”
Reaching up, I take her face, holding her so damn close. “Come home to me,” I tell her again, both of us knowing it’s what’s right, where we are both meant to be.
“I . . . I don’t know,” she says as a perfectly round tear falls from her eye and streaks down her rosy cheek. “I still have so much I want to do, and this business . . . My friend back in New York thinks I can launch it as an online firm, so staying here could be plausible, but then what? What happens if I come home? Do we just pick up where we left off?”
“Yes,” I say without skipping a beat. “That’s exactly what we do. Give us a fucking chance. I know you still love me, and it doesn’t take a genius to figure out that this is what you want. Take the fucking leap, Blair, and come home.”
She searches my eyes, her hands falling to mine on her waist. “You really want this? You can forgive me?”
I lift my hand to her chin, gently holding her there and capturing her stare. “There’s nothing to forgive,” I tell her. “You left Blushing to chase your dreams, and that’s not something I could ever hold against you. While it killed me having to let you go, I was also rooting for you, Blair. I wanted you to achieve everything you set out to do, and you better fucking believe that every time you got a promotion or stuck it to that dickhead boss of yours, I was cheering you on.”
“You . . . wait. How do you know my boss was a dickhead?”
A small smile pulls at my lips, and for just a moment, I wonder if I should keep this to myself, but fuck it, she deserves to know. “I may or may not have had dinner with your nana every Monday night for six years straight, and she may or may not have broken every vow of loyalty between the two of you and told me everything that was happening in your life, right down to that loser Marc you were just dating. She wasn’t very fond of him, but she loved talking about you just as much as I loved hearing it. Except for the Marc part. He sounded like a douchebag.”
Her jaw drops, and she gapes at me as though barely able to believe a word I’m saying. “No. Nana wouldn’t do that to me.”
I scoff. “Damn right, she would. She thought it was hilarious, but only because she knew that one day, you were going to find your way back home. If she thought you’d moved on and were truly trying to find something real in New York, she would have respected your wishes, but at the end of the day, all she wanted was to share with the world how proud she was of you.”
Blair’s tears fall faster, and I pull her into my chest, loving the way she snuggles into me, just like she did when we were teenagers who thought they had everything figured out. “Thank you,” she whispers as her fingers knot into my shirt. “I miss her.”
“I know you do.”
She lets out a heavy sigh, and I bring my fingers to her chin again, needing to see her face, needing to make sure that she’s alright. The moment her chin lifts, those lips are suddenly on mine.
Electricity pulses between us, and I lock my arm firmer around her waist, holding her to me as her lips start to move on mine. I kiss her back, unable to resist the temptation, and within seconds, her body melts into mine.
A soft moan slips through her lips, and I hold her tighter, needing her closeness more than I need my next breath.
When she reluctantly pulls back, she drops her forehead to mine, her chest heaving. “Is now a good time to demand that date you owe me?”
A groan rumbles up my chest as my fingers dig into her hips, knowing it’s not really a date she’s asking for. She wants to take this further, she wants to feel the way we used to be when we were together, wants to feel the way I’d love her.
“You might not remember this as clearly as I do, you know, considering the amount of alcohol you consumed the other night,” I say as my fingers fall to her thigh and slowly trail higher, teasing her with exactly what she wants. “But you might recall that I told you that I won’t be touching you like that, not until you’re on your knees, begging me to take you back.”
She sits back on my lap, her hands falling down between us as she meets my heavy stare, and fuck, the way she looks at me with that intense hunger has me ready to take her right here on Oxley’s porch. “I’m on my knees, Nick,” she says, glancing down between us, and I mean, technically she’s not wrong. She’s straddled over me, her knees braced on the seat on either side of my thighs, but it’s not exactly what I had in mind.
Her gaze lifts back to mine, almost knocking the breath right out of my lungs when she reaches up and hooks her hand behind my neck, leaning in close enough that her breath is nothing more than a slight tickle against my skin. “This is me begging,” she whispers as the world fades around us. “I’m done trying to deny that this is right where I was always supposed to be. I want to come home to you. I want every part of me to belong to only you, and I want to build the life we were always supposed to have. Take me back, Nick. I need to belong to you again.”
My heart pounds as I hold her gaze. “You want to come home?” I ask, barely able to believe it.
“I do,” she says, her grip around the back of my neck tightening. “I’ve been in love with you since the day I first met you in high school, and I’m done trying to pretend as though being away from you like this hasn’t been killing me. This right here, in your arms, this is where I want to spend every day of the rest of my life. I want to have a billion children who all share those same blueish-gray eyes of yours, and I want them to drive me insane. I want to build a home with you and fill it with memories. And . . . shit, Nick. Tell me you want this too because otherwise, I don’t think I could—”
